


Antipyretic

by Dangereuse



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, M/M, Mating Cycles/In Heat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-22
Updated: 2018-06-22
Packaged: 2019-05-23 13:55:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,843
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14935577
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dangereuse/pseuds/Dangereuse
Summary: After the Penguins organization completely fumbles his dynamic needs his rookie year, the front office decides they can't just treat Sidney's omeganess like it will just resolve itself. He's the next best hope for hockey in general and their ticekt to revitalize the Penguins organization They just can't up and abdicate responsibility.For a young unbonded alpha, it would be simple: they'd just find him a "specialist" to take care of his needs. Surely it can't be that different? Right?





	Antipyretic

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Northisnotup](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Northisnotup/gifts).



Sid tried not to spontaneously combust as Therrien nonchalantly dropped a plain looking file folder in his lap. He took a deep breath, in and out, and tried to not to look directly at it as he watched Therrien take a few more steps and drop another near-identical folder into Army’s lap, three more and then Orpik. Sid ran his fingers over the edge of the folder, feeling the sharp, paper-rough edges of the contents inside.

 

It wasn’t abnormal for these plain little folders to go out to players on the Penguins. It was just abnormal for _him._ Sid wanted to gently catch Therrien by the elbow, whisper a quiet little ‘ _I’m an omega’_ , slip him back the file folder, quiet and circumspect. Surely he knew, what Sidney was. Sidney wasn’t on suppressants, as the NHL was still deliberating on whether they were considered performance enhancing drugs; his scent was obvious to any who could smell. 

 

“Saweet,” Army crowed, already opening up his file. He tapped Brooks’ shoulder with the folder and waggled his eyebrows when Brooks leant in and whistled.

 

“Hot,” Army said.

 

“Boys,” Therrien growled out, and Max flipped the file folder shut with an entirely unrepentant grin and winked at Sid. Sid slipped his into his locker before Max noticed he’d been given one of the same. He tucked it in carefully, pressed up against the side wall.

 

***

Sid rescued the file folder after the endless rounds of interviews, for once glad that he was the last one clearing out. The file was bland and unassuming, and Sid _knew_ none of Mellon’s staff was watching him, but he felt obvious and guilty, as if he was the sole focus of a 10,000 lumen spotlight.

 

Sid locked up when he got into Mario and Natalie’s guesthouse, checking windows that he had never checked, secure in the safety afforded by the Lemieux. He put the folder on the corner of his kitchenette countertop, lined it up exactly one inch from each side. He flipped it, to get the tab not the eke into his margin, and then flipped it back, because it felt worse to have the larger side of the folder on top.

 

Sid took a deep breath, sat on one of the counter stools, and opened it up.

 

The first page was one he was painfully, embarrassingly familiar with. His omegan cycle, the rise and dip of his hormones. Sid fastidiously ignored the huge spike back last February in favor of the more recent chartings. He rubbed the crook of his arm. Just looking made him remember the prick of the trainer’s needle. He’d given enough blood to become an honorary blood donor since he’d joined the NHL, if the hormones in his blood hadn’t automatically disqualified him.

 

As always, his little dotted blue line was far away from the solid red of the expected, bobbing above and below and flatlining and, in this last month, from Tuesday, clearly growing, looking almost suspiciously like the rapid rise of last February’s spiking. Sid frowned.

 

He flipped the page.

 

He slammed the manila folder shut.

 

He got up, grabbed a glass of orange juice from the fridge, and gently opened the folder back up with a big bracing breath. Tomorrow’s date, a location, a hotel key. Most damning, a photograph.

 

 _Evgeni Malkin_ , said the caption under the crisp photo. He was smiling, crookedly, like he’d just told a devastatingly funny joke and was waiting for you to bend over laughing.

 

Sidney flipped the page in an effort to stop looking at the photograph. It didn’t work. The next few “pages” were full, glossy photos of the man in the picture. Sid gulped his orange juice. He touched the tips of his fingers to the left of the man’s smiling grin, and he frowned when he left a fingerprint marring the glossy flat of the photo.

 

Sid felt heat pool in his stomach. These were _centerfolds._ These were _softcore porn_. Here was the man, naked from the waist up and lying on his back, arms pillowing his tousled, sleepy head; his gorgeous long legs in sleek black slacks stretched on and on and on and lead to bare vulnerable feet.

 

Here he was, dressed in a rumpled white button up, his clavicles peeking out from the deep vee of where it was unbuttoned, his sleepy, smug smiling face cradled in one ginormous hand.

 

 Here he was, flushed and golden and laughing in the sun, hat slung back off of his face and doing absolutely nothing to block UV, lounging in some ridiculous wet and clingy swim shorts that strained at certain seams.

 

Here he was—

 

“Sidney!” Natalie called, as she jingled the unusually locked door to the guest house. Sid jumped so hard the file went flying, throwing huge glossy photos flying over the brushed stone of the kitchenette’s floor. He scrambled after them, shoving papers left and right back into that damn manila folder.

 

“Yes?” Sid responded, and winced when his voice crawled up and broke at the end.

 

Natalie stopped jingling the door handle. “Sidney, the kids want to know if you’re taking them to the movies this afternoon.”

 

Sid looked at his watch, shoved one more photo semi-viciously back into its folder, and yelled back, “Yeah, yeah, can you ask them to get their shoes on?”

 

***

Sid listened with one ear as the children chittered on about the movie, chasing the last remainder of Natalie’s lasagna sauce around his plate with the last remaining bite of bread. Alexa was gesturing wildly with her fork, and Mario had to reach out one hand and gently lower it before she jabbed Austin in the eye.

 

“Can we go again tomorrow?” Austin pleaded, turning bright and desperate eyes in Sid’s direction.

 

Sid almost agreed automatically, before Mario cut in. “I think Sidney has alternate plans tomorrow.” Mario looked at him significantly, one eyebrow raised.

 

Sid looked at him in surprise, before ducking down at his plate and turning the same color as the sauce. “I’m not sure. I have to check.”

 

Natalie saw the look on his face, and she patted Mario on the thigh before rounding up the kids to help her with the dishes. It was uncertain how much they would help, and how much they would gratuitously splash water around. The dining room was quiet in their wake.

 

“Do you want to borrow the SUV tomorrow?” Mario asked, and Sid felt so off balance for a moment he thought the earth actually had answered his wish and opened up to swallow him.

 

Sid waited, took a deep breath. “I’m not sure what the team wants me to do? I mean, I’m not an alpha?” He ventured. It was true that sports medicine had proved long ago that alpha athletes performed better, were better team players, healed better, got injured less and had reduced stress with a regimen of regular sex, that it served the team best to have regular rosters of professionals to take care of those things, but Sidney…was not an alpha.

 

Mario snorted at him and tapped his nose. He looked at Sidney, his confusion, sighed and leaned forward. “Sidney. The Penguins have made an investment with you and you have performed past our best expectations. But _we_ haven’t been pulling our weight where you and your health are concerned. I’ve been discussing with Shero and Therrien. It was near sighted last year to expect you to have no needs and we _all_ paid for it in February. That was a failure on our part because we didn’t take care of you. What’s even worse, is that we do it for everyone else on the team. Go tomorrow. Have fun. He’s been briefed and will take care of things. If you like him, we can see about adding him to the stable. If you don’t, we’ll find someone else you like better.” He stared at Sid.

 

Sid squirmed in his chair and tried not to think about the glossy spreads in that damn manila folder dossier.

 

Mario stood up, as if all business had just been casually concluded. “I believe I’d like some ice cream for dessert. You?”

 

***

Sidney found himself sitting awkwardly, perched on the edge of a scratchy chair. He purposefully did not look at the bed in the center of the in the hotel room, fingers gripping the fabric of his jeans where he couldn’t quite fit his hands into his pockets comfortably while sitting down.

 

He’d stopped by the front desk on the way up, to see who had checked in, but he was the first on there, and now, the esc— _Evgeni_ , was late. Sid looked around the room again, to check again as if he was really alone, and shifted uncomfortably on the chair. Sid knew he couldn’t just _leave_ , the expectation clear in Therrien’s cavalier pass of the manila folder weighing more than heavy enough to keep him seated, but he was tempted. 

 

The clattering noise of the key card in the lock was late enough that it was pure relief, no dread at all. Sid stood up and refused to give into the urge to dust his pants.

 

Evgeni came through the door like a small natural disaster, hair mussed over his forehead, arms full with an overstuffed duffel and one of those reusable “Oh, still here! Am so sorry! I mean get here early, for scenting, but then Ksenia get hold up and can’t come, but I’m can’t leave kids so—”, Evgeni cut himself off, jiggling the full bags off his shoulder and his hand, dropping them in a heap on the now empty chair, and then he shook himself off and straightened up.

 

Sid had to force himself to take a deep breath. Evgeni was looking at him, soft under those dreamy half-lidded eyes. “I’m glad you wait,” he murmured, voice deep and resounding in his chest. “I’m Geno,” he offered, and then, casually, easily, lifted up his wrist, fingers loose and curled loose into his palm, offering himself to Sid in the Old Ways.

 

Sid blinked down at Geno’s wrist. His hands were in his pockets, somehow, and Sid spared a flash of irritation at himself before he tentatively pulled them out and gripped Geno’s wrist. He formally inclined his head over it in respect for the offer, before raising Geno’s wrist to up to his nose, and making a small polite inhale. Even that small breath was a punch. The alpha smelt so _good. So good._ Sid felt his fingertips gripping tighter, like someone else was driving his grip, and—.

 

He rocked back on his heels, blinked. He fought the urge to steal a second, obnoxiously rude sniff, to bull forward, or even just pass the old words of acquiescence off his lips. He fought not to bite at Geno’s ridiculously ripe lower lip.

 

Sid stepped a back a step and fought not to stammer. “I—I just don’t know.” He finished, stronger than he felt. He bit his lips and refused to bend his head to show his neck. He rubbed his neck, where he felt swollen and vulnerable. _Just from one fucking whiff_. 

 

“Hey, is no problem, yes? Here, try.” Geno stripped himself out of his shirt, the muscles of his shoulders and lean chest rolling; Sid didn’t look away, even though he probably should. Geno tossed it to Sid. Sid caught it automatically. The fabric’s warmth sunk into Sid’s hands, and a wave of the alpha’s scent rolled over him, low and sultry, the scent hitting him like the memory of sipping warmed whiskey, of sticking his fingers into loamy and warm summer earth. Sid found himself bringing the shirt up to his face and letting the warmth of the shirt sink into his cheeks in turn.

 

Sid’s skin felt tight and too sensitive for the crisp button up he’d worn for today. He struggled with himself for a moment before his mouth stopped waiting for the rest of him to make a decision. “Yeah, okay,” Sid breathed out. He almost didn’t recognize the eager note in his own voice.

 

Then Sid winced, hoping he hadn’t _offended_ Geno, not when Geno had been so courteous, offering up his wrist, his _shirt_ for Sid’s comfort. Instead Sid brought up his fingers to the collar of his shirt, unbuttoning enough that the vee of his throat was open to the air. He knew the next steps, even though he’d never thought they would apply to him. Geno had offered his trust, and it was Sid’s turn to offer the same.

 

Geno caught his fumbling hands as they trembled on his collar buttons.

 

“Can I do?” Sid had stiffened up at Geno’s grip, before he forced himself to breathe out and bring his hands down. Geno met his eyes, gently but firmly working Sid’s buttons free and exposing his hot skin to the room. He kept Sid’s gaze as long as he could, before his long neck bent far enough down to brush his nose over the scent glands in the column of Sid's neck.

 

Sid’s whole body felt like he’d stuck his finger into an electrical socket. His body was too hot, he felt like he was melting into his shoes even as his clothes felt as irritating as Saran wrap on the skin. Fuck. Maybe Mario had been on to something. He’d never been dropped so hard and quick into arousal.

 

Geno leaned back, nose gliding a long line up the skin of Sid’s neck, stealing a second whuffling pull of air from behind Sid’s ear. Sid wavered into the light touch, and Geno pulled away, slowly, the air viscous as molasses between them. His eyes were dilated, his pupils wide, and he was grinning, loose and heady and crooked on his face. “You need,” he rumbled. “So long.”

 

Sid couldn’t reply, stuck watching Geno pull his bottom lip from between his teeth. He reached out one hand, and slowly ghosted his hand over Geno’s pec.

 

His skin was _fire_ , and Sid let himself be caught and burned.

 

***

Sid rolled out from under Geno’s arm, spine alight and body pinging, joyously singing all systems go.

 

Geno grasped lazy fingers after him as Sid escaped, grumbling but still refusing to open his eyes. Knotting had wiped Geno out, and now that he’d gone down he was refusing to move. 

 

No fucking wonder the alphas on the team did _this_. Sid rocked in a divot of the sheets, feeling the delicate aching of his neck and shoulders, the base of his spine, feeling the aches burning distantly under that full body flush of pleasure and vitality; he rolled and roughly pushed Geno onto his back. Geno grumbled but went, refusing to open up his eyes much more than slits, but hands came up to grasp Sid’s hips in a grip hard enough to make the burgeoning bruises light all the way up his spine. Sid shivered and pushed Geno’s shoulders harder down onto the bed. He braced his thighs for a roll, but Geno laid quiescent under him, even as he blinked and smiled up at Sid loose and smiley and doofy. Sid’s chest clenched and his hands firmed up on Geno’s shoulders. Suddenly it seemed imperative that Geno. Stayed Right There.

 

Geno turned his head and lightly bussed a kiss on Sid’s wrist. “Feel better?” He rumbled, against the skin of Sid’s wrist, voice low enough to make the bones in Sid’s wrist attenuate to the the vibrations. Sid drew back, rocking his weight onto his heels.

 

“A little,” he lied. He rubbed his wrist, gripped Geno’s hips tighter between his thighs to keep him from moving. 

 

Geno’s brows furrowed, looking over Sid long and hard, before he dropped back loose against the sheets, face smug and chin high. “Good.”

 

***

Sid pulled the glossy frames out of the manila folder and gave the rest back to Mario; Therrien might have put it in his hands at first, but Sid knew who it came from originally. Mario raised his eyebrow at Sid.

 

Sid forced his voice to come out strong. “I liked him.” He knew he was blushing, but he couldn’t care. Mario nodded and tucked the manila folder back onto his desk.

 

They didn’t talk about it, but Sid saw Geno in the halls of Mellon the next day, duffle over his shoulder as Dana showed him from room to room to room, showing him where the physical therapists had their massage tables, where the trainers stocked their supplies, where the stable members stayed to be on hand for emergencies during games. Geno waved at him, smiling and grinning at Sid from across the hall, hair messy and eyebrows raised in exaggerated surprise. Sid waved back, pleasure in his chest.

 

***

Geno slotted into the rush of the hockey season easy. He was there when Sid needed him. Or, rather, when Sid’s carefully tracked cycle demanded it. It was fun to pick him out during a game, grinning and cheering wildly. It was fun to chat with him in the hallways and see him tease Dana as he sharpened skates and (after a disastrous teasing game where he stole one of Sid’s sticks) chasing the rest of his teammates away from where they stood, perfectly taped.

 

It was fun to meet up with Geno, to laugh as Geno decided this time Sid needed a massage, or a tickle fight, or a whole afternoon where he wasn’t to come at all.

 

Sid’s body came to expect a certain response when a file folder got dropped into his lap, and that was it. Came to enjoy the summons, the way his body felt renewed and sated and happy when he came back from meetings with Geno.

 

***

Jordie was a flash of fresh air. Sid couldn’t help but grin at him when he got the call up from Juniors, when they decided to keep him on the roster. Another omega. Another young teammate, filled with enough enthusiasm, with enough belief in himself and the team, that he didn’t feel like he was slogging it alone. It helped. It changed the atmosphere in the room, changed the lingering resentment in the room that Sidney, an omega, held an A. Here was another omega, and he was _good too,_ good enough to have made it here, to the big game. Sidney wasn’t just some upstart, sneaking in, other omegas had earned it. Maybe there might be room for more omegas. This didn’t have to be just the alpha club. 

 

Then Jordie got a file folder.

 

Jordie grimaced down, before waving the folder at Sid’s direction. Sid carefully removed his hockey garters, one after the other, and tried not to clench his hands.

 

“They make us do this alpha bullshit, here?” Jordie scoffed at him. He tossed the folder at Sid, and, well, it hurt how fucking similar it was to his own, the graphs on the first page, the instructions. The pictures. It felt jarring to see those same pictures in the bright lights of the locker room and not the dim light of Sid’s room.

 

Sid shrugged, not trusting himself to speak.

 

Jordie took the folder from him, not even careful with the photos inside.

 

“Not bad.” He tilted his head down at the headshot. “But seriously. I’ve got my own partner. Like, really.” He rolled his eyes, touched a hot looking red mark on his throat and looked to Sid for sympathy. “Do I look like I need somebody to set me up?” Jordie shook his head. He went to Therrien, and Sid pretended he wasn’t listening when Jordie handed the folder back with a word of thanks and little joking laugh that he’d make sure he and his alpha took care of his numbers.

 

Sid changed out of his gear and went through his interviews in a daze. He could only thank his media training when he got home and collapsed onto his bed in Mario’s guest house, not even remembering what he said.

 

He thought about pulling out the pictures from between his mattress, but he pulled his hands under his belly instead, crushing them into the sheets beneath him.

 

***

Honestly, Sidney shouldn’t have been surprised when he got his folder a few days after that, the giant jump on the hormone graph on the first page peaking and skyrocketing.

 

***

Sid was early again, waiting for Geno to arrive. It wasn’t the same room as the first time, but the hotel’s décor was unimaginative enough that it felt the same.

 

“Such eager bird!” Geno commented, when he came through the door, putting his things down.

 

Sid smiled, although he wasn’t quite sure it met his eyes. “It’s eager beaver and early bird,” he rejoindered, soft. Geno was a specialist in this kind of work, the sex work and the omega psychology both, and he was fresh from Russia, where things were a little different and a little less set on the ‘alphas make superior athletes’ mentality, and they bothered to learn those disciplines at all. His English was shaky sometimes, but he tried very hard, experimenting with humor and idiom, and Sid never wanted him to stop wanting to trying to make him laugh.

 

“Nope,” Geno replied obstinately, just to be contrary. “Eager bird. I know.” He moved over to Sid, cupped his cheek in a soft, huge hand, nodded very seriously, eyes big. He stroked Sid’s cheek, but then he moved around him, starting pulling clothes from his duffle. Used shirts, mostly, thick and rich with his scent, mimicking the scent a den would have, if they had been a _real_ couple and had one.

 

“Why you not let me scent room before you get here?” Geno asked, before looking over his shoulder, mischievous. “You know you like better, more comfortable?” He waggled his eyebrows.

 

Sid couldn't fall into the flirting like he always did, swept away by Geno's good humor and the tide of his affection. 

 

Geno wasn’t _his._

 

Sid looked at him, before he surged forward and dropped Geno on his ass on the bed, with an ‘oof’. They fought for it, this time, like they hadn’t really since the first time, rolling across the bed, flipping who was on top, who had their hands pinned. Sid dug in his short nails on whichever piece of Geno’s skin he could reach, and Geno had to pin his arms behind his back and make him _bleed_ with his teeth before Sid would yield to him.

 

Sid panted, afterwards. He petted Geno’s back while his knot held them, feeling the rough raised skin he’d just torn into with vicious fingers. Geno pressed a sweet kiss to his neck, out of it as he always was when the passion was spent. Sid’s body felt just as good as usual, but his mind was spinning as he stared at the ceiling Geno grumbled into his neck and mouthed against the oversensitive skin there. He gripped the back of Geno’s neck for the briefest second, too hard, before he made himself release the grip.

 

"You okay, Sid?" Geno asked, dreamy as ever. 

 

Sid just patted Geno's skin until he fell back into his doze. 

 

***

Sid wasn’t surprised when his cycle numbers didn’t go down and instead rose dramatically. He could feel it in his skin, see it in the way the alphas on the team treated him. Like he was a peach almost ready to eat, a deked puck that the goalie was opening up to.

 

Sid knew the training staff were worried. He’d peaked last February, supposedly randomly, and here he was, barely November after months of consistent and rhythmic low monthly fluctuations and his numbers reading the oldest story there was.

 

He didn’t get a folder this time. Geno came to sit next to him on the bench as he cleaned some disgustingly sticky Gatorade off him with some baby wipes one of the press ladies had extracted from her purse with a sympathetic grimace. He debated whether he should just shower it off, whether he had time before his next engagement. Sid sighed. He'd never quite understand the merits of a photoshoot to sell a product where he wasn’t supposed to drink it so much as artistically dribble it down his chin.

 

“Sid,” Geno started, soft. His body was a nice warm line of heat on Sid’s side. “I need to ask couple questions, yes?”

 

Sid nodded, leaned back and meticulously cleaned the same spot again with a baby wipe.

 

“How long your heat usually last, Sid?”

 

Sid tried not to make eye-contact, knowing that Geno had to know this already. “Last time it was five days.”

 

Sid didn’t look, but he felt Geno raise his eyebrows in the space between them. “For full heat?" Sid nodded. "That’s long time.”

 

Sid shrugged, started in on another spot with a fresh wipe.

 

“I think is best, we get apartment. I’m stay there while you ramping, get supplies, make sure scent feels safe, familiar. Then you come when you feel heating, and we stay as long as last. Time is usually more short with alpha, but sometimes is not true.” Geno shrugged, then grinned. “Is more easy, for sure. Then we sleep some, because I’m tire you out good.” Geno nudged him with his elbow, smiling. “You feel good about plan?”

 

Sid gave up on the wipe, balled it up in a fist. “For sure.”

 

Geno frowned at him, paused. “Is not be scary, Sid. I take care. Be better than last.”

 

Sid looked down. That wasn’t a real high bar, there. Just about anything would be better than last time. He sauced the wipe across the room, watched it sink into a trash can, followed it, one, two, three with its soiled friends. Geno hit his elbow for the last one, and the wipe splatted on the rim of the can instead. Sid punched Geno in the shoulder, but even he could tell it was half-hearted. Geno looked at him worried, then laid a soft hand on his thigh and turned to look at him. “I’m take care,” he reassured, giving Sid a small squeeze.

 

“Yeah, for sure,” Sid replied, smiling weakly, but still not quite making eye contact.

 

“I’m take care,” Geno repeated more firmly, and Sid almost found himself believing it.  

 

***

Geno didn’t have the opportunity to move into the little loft the Penguins had rented for the occasion. Sid woke up in a hot sweat at two o’clock in the morning and knew it was on. He woke up the on-call training staff, grabbed what Army called his bug out bag and was rifling through the car keys in the big bowl in the kitchen when Natalie caught him.

 

“Let me take you, she whispered, patting him gently on his hand, trembling even now, already. Even that soft contact from another omega made him feel too much. He smiled acknowledgement and slipped his hand out from under hers, stuffed it in the pocket where it couldn’t shake and betray him. “Okay.”

 

***

Geno was waiting for him outside the little apartment they’d be sharing, looking fresh from his own bed, worried and looking a little harried.

 

“Always so early, Sid,” he mock complained, as he helped Sid out of the car, steadied him by the elbow when Sid misjudged how far his foot was from the ground and nearly tumbled. “Never let me prep. No prepare. Not let me treat you good, make things nice. Always have to ruin my plan, make me rush.” Geno brought up his hand, careful, cradling the back of Sid’s neck and holding him firm and steady so he could check the dilation of his eyes and the flush of blood in his cheeks.

 

Sid listed into Geno almost against his will, nose falling into that sweet sweaty hollow on Geno’s neck where his scent was thick enough Sid wanted to roll in it. “I let you fuck me with your fingers all the time. That’s prep.” Sid complained, voice soft, as he tested his tongue to that scent-rich spot, feeling Geno jolt at the touch and his grip firm up.

 

Natalie laughed under her breath and looked away as she handed Sid his bag. Sid tensed when she neared, turned to watch her suspiciously.

 

“Give me a call when it’s done, I’ll come get him,” she murmured soft to Geno, and Sid bared his teeth at her. How dare she speak to his, his. _His_ Geno.

 

She backed away, a few steps, smiling soft. “Feel better, Sid.”

***

Sid didn’t feel better.

 

Geno fucked him as soon as they got inside, to settle him. Sid let it happen, roughly pleased at the attention and willing to wallow in it. But the scent of the loft was bothering him and he didn’t feel any easing; everything was so clean, all vinegar and bleachy smells; no smells of food, or pets or even the accumulated dust of living, and certainly none of he and Geno. He wriggled through it and only settled when Geno pinned his hands and tucked him face down on the too-clean sheets and praised him for his sweetness.

 

Two hours later he nearly broke Geno’s arm, fighting him down onto his back for the pleasure of getting his dick deep in him.

 

Four hours and a small nap after that, he wouldn’t let Geno touch him, even if Geno begged, thrashing and refusing the slightest comfort, but screaming if Geno’s attention wasn’t on him.

 

Another six hours and Geno held him up under the cool spray of the shower and ate him out relentlessly, trying to cool the frightening ramp of heat of his body, Sid’s hot and agitated tears hidden in the spray.

 

Two more and Sid couldn’t hold still unless he was knotted. He had refused food and water unless Geno tricked him with kisses. Geno looked wild around the eyes even as he kissed Sid’s cheeks and mouth with frighteningly soft busses of his mouth.

 

Three later had Geno tying Sid from the elbow to the wrist so he couldn’t claw vicious and painful at Geno and himself in his desperation to have it harder, dammit. Now.

 

Two more and Sid finally settled down long enough for Geno to fuck him gentle and slow and face to face. Sid fell asleep halfway through and nearly strangled Geno when he pulled out before finishing and knotting.

 

The cycle continued, and Sid didn’t feel better. Sid sometimes heard Geno on the phone, relaying their progress; he couldn’t stand that Geno wasn’t thinking of him, fucking him. Geno packed him in the tub with ice, hand fed him even as he bit and snapped, gave him oral until his jaw had to be nearly broken. It hurt to be taken but it hurt ten times worse to be empty. He didn’t sleep longer than it took a knot to fade and he wasn’t sure Geno slept at all.

 

On the third day, Geno fed him an emergency suppressant; Sid threw it up so violently he shook for hours afterwards. He was burning hot, insensate. Geno burned him and soothed him in turns, the touch of his hands the only thing that made him feel good and yet sometimes made him feel worse.

 

Sid didn’t feel better.

 

“Am I dying?” Sid asked, slurred, after Geno had taken him slow and soft, ice packs arrayed around him like a shroud. He reached for Geno’s hand. Geno took it up in his huge one, and brushed away his sweaty, nasty hair with the other. Geno’s lips were chapped and the bags under his eyes were deep and dark.

 

“Not while I am watch.” Geno growled, squeezed his hand. Sid smiled at him and passed out.

 

***

Sid woke up in a hospital bed. There was an IV in his arm, and the arm itself was bound to the bed rail with wide thick white cuffs. Geno was asleep with his head pillowed on his thighs, above the blankets. Mario and Natalie sat in chairs in the corner. He felt like he’d been roasted alive and then freeze dried. His leg was asleep but he didn’t dare jostle Geno’s head. He looked as bad as Sid felt.

 

Natalie saw him wake. She put Mario’s hand carefully down on his thigh and stepped closer to the bed. “How do you feel,” she whispered, softly.

 

“Not so good,” Sid whispered. Natalie rooted around and found a cup of ice chips. She fed Sid one. It was the best thing he’d ever felt as it slipped into his mouth. He sucked on it, even as it made his teeth ache with the cold, desperate for the moisture.

 

***

There was a big discussion when everybody was awake and accounted for, and Sid fumed in his bed the whole time. If they were just going to talk over him, then they might have had the decency of not bothering his rest.

 

“Is there any reason Sid spiraled so hot?” Mario asked the doctor, and Geno nodded along. The doctor was a short alpha, old but of color and apparent character of iron. She didn't flinch under their combined regard.

 

She looked at Sid’s clipboard and patted his foot through the rough cotton hospital blanket, and then addressed Mario. After all, he held Sid’s omega guardianship. Sid arched his foot away. “These things aren’t an exact science. Heating is different in every omega. And Sid has only recently started his adult cycling, with his full wet heats. This is the second he’s had. He might just be settling as his body figures things out. He might have been triggered by a certain event. All I can suggest is that he talk to a counselor, see if this was triggered by a stress event in his life. Of course, there is the slim chance this will be the severity level of his heats,” she continued, flipping through her clipboard, “but that is unlikely, considering how well his irregular hormonal cycle responded to regular mounting—”

 

Sid picked at the blanket with sore fingers. “When can I play again?” Sid asked, half to know, and half to get Mario so disgusted with him that he would drop this line of questioning and instead lecture Sid about how, even if it might be hard to see it now, hockey wasn’t everything. That was a language they both spoke better.

 

The doctor looked at him with assessing eyes. “Well, there’s nothing wrong with you anymore, per se. You lost a significant amount of fluids, Sid. I’d like to see you get hydrated. But you didn’t lose a lot of weight, and it looks like Geno took a damn good job of you, considering. We’ll have to see how you feel after we continue your IV for a while.” She patted Sid’s foot again, this time with the clipboard. “I think you’ll bounce back in remarkable time.”

***

Geno stayed with him in the hospital as the nurses unbound his arm from the rail and hooked him up to another bag. Mario and Natalie trooped home, needed as they were with their kids. 

 

“What happened?” Sidney asked him, propped up under a million blankets. He felt cold now, now that his heat had faded, and the cool trickle of the fluid drip in his arm didn’t help. He artfully laid his hand off the side of the bed, close enough to Geno’s thigh that he might be motivated to pick it up.

 

Geno didn’t disappoint, taking Sid’s hand in two of his, dwarfing it between his two hot palms.

 

Geno shrugged, uncomfortable. “You get too hot, I can’t… bring you ease, soothe burn. You get more hot than is safe. I’m make call that I’m not help enough, that you need doctor. I bring you here. I think they give you sleep drug, anti-heat medicine, but needed to be through arm, so they have to tie down. You thrash, and. Stomach not,” Geno made an expansive gesture that made it seem like his stomach was coming out of his throat. “Eventually, it start work. You cool down, start sleep.” Geno let out a big breath.

 

“Thank you for taking care of me,” Sid smiled at him, feeling soft and tender. “I’m sorry it didn’t work out like you planned.”

 

Geno snorted. “You live to destroy plan,” Geno said, unfairly. “And of course, I’m take care. I’m promise to you.” His voice seemed a little hollow.

 

Sid smiled at him, squeezed his hands. He felt himself drift off. He hoped Geno got some sleep too. 

 

***

Jordie looked rough when Sid got back. Not quite as rough as Sid felt, but having had the bright flush of Geno’s attention made him feel full up and magnanimous, and the feelings before made him feel petty. Made him feel like a bad friend. He and Jordie were friends, teammates. He remembered the shared bright flush of pleasure from scoring a goal on Jordie’s assist, of flipping the puck possession and saucing a pass straight to Jordie down the ice.

 

Sid sidled up to him. “What’s up, man?” He asked, quiet enough that Jordie could ignore him if he wanted, but loud enough that Jordie knew he cared. If he didn’t take care of Jordie, then who would? No one would quite understand like he did. No one was living this experience quite the same way as he was, but Jordie came close.

 

Jordie sighed, lacing his skate. “My alpha decided to up and go. Right before my fucking heat. Like, seriously, I can’t deal with this now. Right in the middle of the season and too close for me to find a good replacement candidate. Asshole probably wanted to set me up to squirm it out alone.” Jordie sniffed. Sid could see the redness around his eyes and hear the slight roughness in his voice. “I just don’t want to deal with this right now? You know?” Jordie shook his head.

 

Jordie looked Sid over, winced for him. “I heard your heat went like shit, yeah? Did the alpha guy in the stable do right by you?”

 

“Yeah,” Sid forced himself to say. “Yeah, he did.” He looked away so he wouldn’t have to see the considering look on Jordie’s face.

***

Sidney wasn’t supposed to be able to get the home addresses of where the Penguins staff lived. It was unprofessional and a gross violation of boundaries and also really easy when he brought Natalie’s special snickerdoodles to Jane in Payroll.

 

Sidney pulled up in front of the brick apartment structure in Natalie’s SUV. He had his own manila folder, albeit thicker and without the glossy photo spreads. It was also pink, nicked from Natalie’s home office supplies. Sid gripped it, like a talisman. This state of events couldn’t continue. It was distracting him from hockey, was making him resent a teammate that he actually really liked, was fucking up his head when he was supposed to be thinking about accepting the Captaincy and leading his team. He and Jordie were killing it this year, were really turning it around and making the league take notice, and if there was anything Sid learned from last year, it was that he could play his best but he couldn’t drag the whole team to the playoffs by himself.

 

Sid took a deep breath and forced himself out of the car. He consulted the little post-it in Jane’s clean looping handwriting and headed for the stairs. He stopped at the door, took a few deep fortifying breaths and flipped through his folder, checking he had everything.

 

Sid knocked at the door, absently wishing he could have Pat here, to do the negotiating. He felt as awkward and as uncertain as he had when he first negotiated his contract with the Penguins.

 

There was some grumbling in Russian, and then an alpha Sid didn’t know opened the door. He was older, and he had a small child on his hip. “Zhenya!” He called, as he and the small girl looked him over seriously. “There is young man at door for you!”

 

Sid would recognize the frustrated snort from inside anywhere, even if he didn’t understand the flood of Russian that followed it.

 

Geno came up short when he saw Sid. “Sid! What you doing here?” he asked, and he didn’t even seem to care as the other man pushed him forward into the outdoor catwalk, closer to Sid. He leaned forward, grabbed Sid by the hand. “How are you feel? Okay? Need something?”

 

“Ksenia,” the man called back into the apartment. “We need one more for dinner.” He shut the door behind Geno. Geno looked back, over his shoulder, sighed, but returned his attention to Sid.

 

“Doing good?” He asked, earnest.

 

Sid flushed, enjoying the feel of Geno holding his hand. “Yeah, I’m doing a lot better. Thanks to you.”

 

Geno looked down. “Is kind, but not true. I not help when it counts.”

 

Sid frowned. “Of course you did, Geno.”

 

Geno frowned at him, dropped Sid’s hand, gently. “What you need, Sid?” His voice was gentle. “You hear I put letter to quit today?”

 

“I wanted to talk to you about—wait, what, quit? Geno, why did you quit? Are you going back to Russia? Is your family okay? Did you get a better job over there?” Sid asked, rapidly getting more and more alarmed. "Is your mom okay?"

 

“No, Mama and Papa and Denis all good. I’m not think I go back to Russia so soon, but must see what Visa say, now no job.” Sid frowned. He’d never thought about the fine details of that very much. The front office took care of that, making sure he showed up for his interviews on time, and maintained all his requirements. Maybe he really should have brought Pat. But that was incidental. Maybe he could call him in later, if he needed to. 

 

“Why did you quit, Geno?”

 

Geno looked at his hands, and he looked so hangdog that Sid wanted to step forward, wrap his gangly body up in his arms. “I’m not good alpha for you,” Geno grunted out, quiet, like it hurt to say.

 

Sid blinked. “What?” Of all the things Sid could have expected. Not a good alpha? What? "Who said that to you?"

 

Geno looked up at him, shook his head. “I’m not be good alpha to you. Make you most sick.”

 

Sid’s mouth fell open. He didn’t even know what to say to that.

 

Geno looked away again. “I’m most sorry, Sid. I’m make promise, to care for you, and I can’t keep properly.”

 

Sid forced himself to close his mouth. “Ok.” He took a deep breath. “No. That’s not—no.” Sid shook his head. “I came here to ask you to be my alpha, Geno.”

 

It was Geno’s turn to blink.

 

Sidney took another deep, fortifying breath. “I need you to be my alpha for real, Geno.” Sid closed his eyes. He’d practiced this, and this was important. “I can’t share you. I went crazy thinking about how you might sleep with Jordie, or you might need to help another omega if he we get another on our team. And I can't think like that. I can’t deal with that.” Sid opened his eyes, looked at Geno. “I want you to be mine. I need you to be mine. I can pay you what the front office does, and we can have a contract like that, or…” Sid took a deep breath, shored up his bravery for one big request, the true desire of his heart. “Or we could mate,” his voice came out a whisper. “Then you could have half of everything I have.”

 

Geno looked torn, gutted. “Oh Sidka, no, I can’t be your alpha.”

 

Sid felt tears grow in the corners of his eyes. “Why not?” Sid looked away, flicked the wetness out of the corners of his eyes with his fingers, tried to continue. He couldn’t give up. “If you,” his voice wavered, and Sid firmed himself up again, cleared his throat, “don’t feel like that for me, I can pay you like the front office. I can pay you more, even.”

 

“Is not about money, Sid! Is not about feel!” Geno exploded. “I’m not good mate stock for you! I can’t even soothe heat! You so sick, and nothing I do help. I make love to you, every way I know how, try to please you, try to make your body take to me, and _nothing I do cool your heat!_ ”

 

Sid closed his eyes, felt the water welling out around the edges of his lashes. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I just wanted you to mate me so badly.” Sid wiped his nose with the back of one hand. “I’m sorry. I’m pretty sure it was my fault. I think I wanted it so bad my heat wouldn’t cool.”

 

Geno rocked back on his feet, looking physically struck; then he surged forward. His big thumbs reached up to cradle Sid’s cheeks, to wipe away the moisture there. “Oh, Sidka,” he crooned. “Is true?”

 

Sid nodded, unable to speak. His throat felt itchy and his chest felt too big. “Yeah. It’s true.” He inhaled, and a fresh glut of wetness hit his cheeks. “I think I love you.” Sid knew it was a cop out, but he couldn’t make himself go that far, after all this confession, after asking Geno for so much.

 

Geno grabbed him up, wrapping him in his arms, clutching him tight enough that his ribs were just this side of creaking. “Shh, don’t cry,” he rocked Sid, gently, “Sidka, no. Yes, yes, I’m be your alpha, of course. I want be your mate, I want marry you. I want claim you in front of everyone, want take your hand to be mine, want put my babies inside you.”

 

Sid snuffled harder. “Really?” he asked. He hadn’t quite let himself hope, even as he came over here, pink manila folder filled with two contracts, two options: an employment and a mating one.

 

“Yes.” Geno answered, before pulling Sid away, just to cradle his face in his big hands again, wiping about the salty itch of his tears. “Yes. I’m want so much. Want most.”

 

Sid smiled, watery, and he stepped back in to Geno, planting his face hard against Geno’s chest. He loved the feel of Geno’s arms wrapping back around him, crushing him in, holding him close. Sid nestled there, and snuffled, trying to stop with every breath. It was hard, his relief making the tears well up almost better than his pain. Geno cupped the back of his head, soothed him. His muttered words sounded wet too, strained.

 

The Russian man from earlier popped his head out from behind the door. “Is that settled then? Ksenia says dinner is ready.”

 

Sid broke away, laughed, and loved that Geno reeled him back in, stowing him under his arm, like he fit perfectly. “I think maybe so.”


End file.
